Morals Of Vampire {#3}

Part 17

[Part 17]

"Welcome back." The greeting came as Kieran grinned, looking around at his party.

"You know, if you talk to me for any longer, Jean-Jacques would banish me all the way to North Pole and keep me there." Kieran teased, but Renee only blushed and rolled her eyes, offering him a drink.

"Really, he isn't that bad. He's just too protective of the Coven and Council sometimes."

"I'd say." Kieran answered, taking a sip of the vintage wine. "I shudder to think of how protective he exactly is over you."

"Don't be such a tease." Renee scolded lightly. "Now that you're back, do try to not piss him off? I don't want to deal with an angry, uptight fiancé every day."

"You two are gossiping about me again?" The man in topic was quick to appear in territorial claim over his future wife, but Kieran grinned himself stupid in the remembrance of how confused and flustered the normally-composed man had been back in France. Kieran had seen the struggle so clearly in Jean-Jacques's eyes when Fernandez first bullied the man into agreeing to lift the ban over Kieran in exchange for the allowed passage back to North America.

"Ahh..." Kieran interrupted Renee before she could offer a peaceful reconciliation between the men. "Here comes the prick of the Council."

Once again, a brief flash of annoyance passed Jean-Jacques's face, but Kieran gave him brownie points for never losing that amiable half-smile.

"Say what you will, but I only accepted your return back in exchange for Louis's leave to go back to France. It was killing him, and killing us to watch him." Jean-Jacques excused, but Kieran only rolled his eyes.

"Own it up; you allow me back only because you know who I am now, and you want me to stop the war." Kieran argued knowingly, and at least the Head of Securities of the North American Council knew enough than to argue. "Not going to happen, buddy."

"Di dio," Dante's intervention was welcomed, interrupting Jean-Jacques's imminent protest of reply, "give the old man a break. Besides, if he is Skalov and Cian's master, you can't possibly ask him to choose a side. It's like asking Cian to choose between you and me, amico."

"In which I am sure my little brother will choose Dante over your prickly self." Kieran added just for the insult, earning a clap on the back of approval from the Casanova man, and a dismayed half-protest from Renee. Jean-Jacques, however, remained wisely silent, consent to simply glaring at the man for his words.

"Kieran!" Roger-Luc's enthusiastic interruption surprised everyone, but Kieran only smiled at the warm welcome from the young vampire. "I'm glad to see you back, but I've got to go. I'm meeting my father again after so long, and I can't be late. Let's go, Renee."

"The meeting is not until another ten minutes." Rene reminded gently, but the young vampire didn't seem to care as he tugged on hard to his sister's arm.

"Come on; I'm not going to Hurricane Renee my way in like you always do." Roger-Luc excused quickly, with a no-nonsense attitude, as the men watched Devaux siblings disappear from the crowd.

"That young boy's in a hurry." Louis joined the circle with a look of amusement following the two. "It is always interesting to see the young run around, never truly grasping the concept of time."

"That's because you're old." Kieran reminded with a grin, though inside, he knew exactly what Louis was referring to. When time passed on, and the human lives simply flowed through fingertips, vampires tended to look on the young with envy, and rue their own view of their long life. Usually riddled with secrets and a bad past that was hard to forget, older vampires like Louis and himself tended to see the young in a softer light.